A Rose By Any Other Name
by Doylestown
Summary: Have dreams about Spike? Who doesn't? Experience Spike/William as he is in Buffy's nocturnal state. Feedback is the bread of a writer's life. Feed me. Please...


This Mini-fic is taken directly after Wrecked.

Disclaimer: This is the point where I tell you I own nothing, I am nothing, and I want nothing...but would still like your feedback...please...

A rose by any other name would still smell as sweet.- William Shakespeare

Buffy sat up suddenly and looked around her. She was on a stone bench in the middle of a rose garden. The flowers were bathed in the iridescent light of the moon. She closed her eyes for a second, just to take in the intoxicating smell of the roses. The fragrance seemed to reach out and touch her. She allowed herself to relax for a moment. Then suddenly her eyes flew open. "_Where am I_?", she wondered. She stood up and took a step and almost fell over. She looked down and noticed she was wearing tightly laced boots, under a very fancy dress, with an extremely tight bodice. "_Didn't I do this a few Halloweens ago?", _she thought to herself. 

"Excuse me, m'lady", a voice called out from behind her. Her head snapped to attention as she spun around. Before her stood a young man, about her age. 

He wore a tan double-breasted jacket, white shirt and brown trousers. She looked at his face and noticed how his light brown hair gently framed his strong cheekbones. She paused in thought for a second, he wasn't the type of boy she was used to seeing. He looked like someone out of a Victorian era romance novel, the ones her mom used to read. 

"Do...do I know you?", she asked the stranger. 

He smiled shyly and looked down at his feet, turned his head slightly and lifted his eyes to once again meet her gaze. "In my dreams you hold me close as we dance. I am nothing if not lost in the warmth of your embrace, the feel of your heart beating against my chest. I am warmed by the light of your love...", his voice trailed off as his eyes searched her face once more. 

There was a silent gentleness about the way his eyes searched her face... and she could feel the beat of her heart quicken as his eyes met hers and they were locked together in an embrace that seemed somehow familiar to her. 

"Who is he?", she wondered as she grew more frustrated at not being able to place his face, his eyes. She could feel a wave of recognition attempting to fill her heart. She stood there and silently willed the wave to engulf her, to wash away the uncertainty and fill her heart with the knowledge and understanding that seemed to escape her mind - to help her discover who this man was and why his words touched her heart so. 

His eyes broke away from hers and she could see a red blush slowly filling his cheeks. Her eyes followed his and rested on the destination of his gaze. He was looking at a rosebush. 

Quickly, as if on impulse, he reached out and picked a perfect rose and held it up to the moonlight. 

She noticed how the moonlight played with the satiny texture of the rose. It was the deepest shade of red she had ever seen. 

He turned to her once more. Their eyes found each other and she could feel her heart begin to race. "You will need this..." he quietly whispered as he placed the rose in her hand. Her eyes moved from his to the rose that lay in her hand. Without a word he turned and walked away. 

With each breath she took, he seemed to get farther and farther away. "Wait!", she shouted and began to run after him. But he was gone. 

She tripped on something and found herself falling to the ground. _"What the hell..."_ , she muttered. 

She couldn't see very well, as the moonlight seemed to be blocked by a cloud. Her eyes adjusted to the darkness and she began looking around trying to get her bearings. "Damn this dress!" She cursed. She felt around her and winced as she felt a sharp pricking sensation in her finger. "What was that!", she asked herself eyes straining in the bitter darkness. Her fingers felt a smooth, satiny texture. _"Oh_,", she thought to herself, _"It's the rose."_

As she tried to pick it up, her hand brushed up against something cold and clammy. She froze in fear. Suddenly moonlight filled the sky and she could see clearly what was before her. She gasped in horror. Lying on the ground before her was the man from the garden. She hurried to his side. 

"Wake up!" she yelled as she shook his shoulders. She grabbed the sides of his face desperately searching for signs of life. His eyes were open and fixed, gone was the warmth of his gaze. His face cold to her touch. Her eyes searched his face for a moment. She felt a tear rolling down her cheek and watched silently as it fell on his cheek and ran down the side of his face. Her hands dropped from his face to his neck. She could feel a sticky substance on her fingers. She held them up to the light of the moon and saw it was blood. "Oh, yeah.." she thought, "the rose. The thorn pricked me." She sighed and turned to get up. 

She glanced one more time at the lifeless body that lay before her. Her eyes caught sight of something on his neck. She strained and moved in for a closer look. She gently moved his head to the side. "Oh my God..." she thought as she saw the two very neat puncture marks on his neck. Beneath them was a trickling of blood. 

She looked at her fingers and glanced back at his neck. "His blood." She said silently to herself, "His blood is on my hands." Her eyes traveled back to where the rose lay. She picked it up and rested it gently on his chest, close to where his silent heart lay. 

She wiped away the tears that were now streaming down her face. She could taste the tears, mixed with the blood, his blood and hers. She struggled to her feet and turned to leave. 

She hesitated for a second when she heard a voice; his voice saying to her, "You will need this..." she turned around and looked back to the ground where he lay. His face was still. 

She almost turned to leave, but as she did so her eyes traveled back to his chest. As she moved closer, she saw that the rose was gone and in its place was a large wooden thorn... a stake... She bent over and picked it up. She held the wooden stake in her hand and presses it tightly against her chest. She squeezed as hard as she could, until she could feel the sharp side of the thorn piercing her flesh. She cried out in pain as the stake dropped out of her grasp, turned back into the rose and fell silently to the ground. 

Darkness

"You know it's dead, don't you" Anya said matter-of-factly as she filled the vase with water and handed it to Buffy. 

"What?" Buffy asked confused. 

"The flower. It's dead. Started dying as soon as it was picked from the bush." She replied as she grabbed the vase, shoved the rose into it and handed it back to Buffy. "I don't see the big deal about giving flowers.", she continued as she opened the register, "It's like, 'Here, I like you so much I am going to give you something that is dead. So everyday you can watch it get a little more withered until it all falls apart and you have to throw it in the trash. And this is how you will always remember my love for you - Rotting and decomposing...dead from the beginning it was given you.' , she said while fingering the paper bills lovingly, "Darn waste of money, if you ask me". 

Buffy shook her head and rolled her eyes. 

Dawn came over to Buffy and smelled the rose. "MMMmmmm," she breathed, "It sure smells good for something that is dead." She touched the petals and continued, "It feels nice too, all satiny and smooth-like I think it's nice, Buffy." 

"Well Bufster, I'm gonna have to side with Anya on this one..", Xander piped in as he walked over to Buffy, "and what's up with those nasty little thorny things? You go to hold it and bammm! it draws your blood." 

"Oh, don't listen to Xander.", Willow giggled," he prefers gifts of the, ya know, keep-on-giving variety.". 

"Hey! I heard that Will." hollered Xander. 

"Yes," pouted Anya, "that was NOT funny. Besides he only had the syphilis once and now it is gone. Right sweetie?", she said as she put her arm around him and kissed him on the cheek. 

"Well,", said Willow, "There is a way you can get rid of all those ...pointy little thorny things.." 

'NO!", Tara yelled as she walked up to Willow, "No more magic!" 

"Geesh...I wasn't talking about magic", Willow said quietly, looking down, 'I just meant you could pull the little thorny things off, that's all...you know, pluck the pointies..." 

"But it wouldn't be the same would it? I mean...without the thorns and all..", Buffy asked in a low voice, "right guys?" 

"Well, technically speaking", Giles spoke from the corner of the room, "It would still be a rose by definition...however..", he removed his glasses and began wiping them with his shirt, "It would be missing an important part of it's identity." 

Everyone looked at him strangely. 

He squinted for a moment and put his glasses back on, "Because the thorns are a part of the rose, actually evolving before the flower itself begins life, one would think it wouldn't be complete without them." 

"Thorns or no thorns, it really doesn't matter.", Anya said while returning the bills to the register, "It is still dead as a doornail." 

Everyone nodded in agreement. 

"Yeah, it's dead for sure," a voice came from the shadows in the room. Buffy's head snapped in the direction of the voice. Spike was leaning up against the wall, lighting a cigarette. She found herself slowly moving in his direction. He slowly inhaled on the cigarette, then exhaled as he looked at her sideways, whispering in her direction, "But you *still* need it, Slayer." 

Darkness

Buffy sat on the steps of the back porch. In her hands she held the rose, admiring its beauty. She touched its petals gently. She closed her eyes as she inhaled the sweetness of its fragrance. She opened her eyes and smiled down at the rose. Slowly, she plucked one petal and dropped it to the ground, "He loves me...", she began as she plucked another petal, "He loves me not, He loves..." 

A hand gently closed over hers, she looked up to see his eyes meet hers. "Don't you already know the answer to that one, Luv?", he asked gently, head cocked to one side, eyes searching her face. 

She jerked her hand away from him. "I need it... I need them", she said looking at the flower. 

"What, luv? What do you need?" He met her gaze, "You need the rose? The petals?", his eyes searched hers once more as his hand gently touched her face. 

She remained silent. 

"if you need it, luv, why are you tearing it apart, destroying it?" 

"No.", She said as she pushed his hand away, clutching the rose close to her chest, "I don't need ...petals..." 

"Then what? What do you need?" , he asked with wonder in his eyes. 

"I...need...", she stood up and walked away from him, "...thorns.", she said as she clutched the rose tighter, feeling the thorns biting into her chest, "I *need* the thorns..." 

Darkness

Buffy sat up with a jolt. The early morning light streaming into her room. She smelled a strange odor. She blinked as she looked around and noticing the masses of garlic hanging next to her window, around her bed. 

"Garlic???...Oh yeah, Spike..", she suddenly remembered. She winced as she felt a sharp pain in her chest. She lowered her eyes to her chest thinking of the wooden cross she so desperately clung to through the night. 

She relaxed and allowed herself to lift her hand up and away from her chest. She was surprised with how light the cross felt in her hand. It was only when she looked at her hand that she realized she was holding a rose. 

She held it up and noticed how the sunlight played against the satiny texture of the rose. It was the deepest shade of red she had ever seen. Her eyes traveled to the base of the bud and just below, to the stem. She could see the sharp thorns hidden at the base of the leaves. Without thinking, she began plucking the thorns off the stem. 

As the thorns fell one by one to the ground below her, she could hear a voice, his voice saying, 'You need me, you need me not..."

She clutched the rose to her heart, closed her eyes and, in a secret place in her mind, a place far away from conscious thought, where rules of reason and logic do not apply, she could hear a voice, her voice calling out into the darkness, "I *need* this..."


End file.
